Burkina Faso opens 164-tonne gold refinery. Now it needs the gold
Burkina Faso's president, Ibrahim Traoré, opened the country's first gold refinery on 28 September. Traoré said the ambition is no longer simply to extract raw materials and ship them abroad, and that the country wants to refine all its metals domestically. The refinery is described as having a capacity of 164 tonnes.
Why it matters: It is a case of resource nationalism, in which an African producer state seeks to capture refining value at home instead of exporting unprocessed gold.